Showing papers by "Leslie G. Ungerleider published in 2014"

Selective Dissociation Between Core and Extended Regions of the Face Processing Network in Congenital Prosopagnosia

Abstract: There is growing consensus that accurate and efficient face recognition is mediated by a neural circuit composed of a posterior “core” and an anterior “extended” set of regions. Here, we characterize the distributed face network in human individuals with congenital prosopagnosia (CP)—a lifelong impairment in face processing—relative to that of matched controls. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we first uncover largely normal activation patterns in the posterior core face patches in CP. We also document normal activity of the amygdala (emotion processing) as well as normal or even enhanced functional connectivity between the amygdala and the core regions. Critically, in the same individuals, activation of the anterior temporal cortex (identity processing) is reduced and connectivity between this region and the posterior core regions is disrupted. The dissociation between the neural profiles of the anterior temporal lobe and amygdala was evident both during a task-related face scan and during a resting state scan, in the absence of visual stimulation. Taken together, these findings elucidate selective disruptions in neural circuitry in CP and offer an explanation for the known differential difficulty in identity versus emotional expression recognition in many individuals with CP.

Lesions of prefrontal cortex reduce attentional modulation of neuronal responses and synchrony in V4

Abstract: It is widely held that the frontal eye field (FEF) in prefrontal cortex (PFC) modulates processing in visual cortex with attention, although the evidence that it is necessary is equivocal. To help identify critical sources of attentional feedback to area V4, we surgically removed the entire lateral PFC, including the FEF, in one hemisphere and transected the corpus callosum and anterior commissure in two macaques. This deprived V4 of PFC input in one hemisphere while keeping the other hemisphere intact. In the absence of PFC, attentional effects on neuronal responses and synchrony in V4 were substantially reduced and the remaining effects of attention were delayed in time, indicating a critical role for PFC. Conversely, distracters captured attention and influenced V4 responses. However, because the effects of attention in V4 were not eliminated by PFC lesions, other sources of top-down attentional control signals to visual cortex must exist outside of PFC.

Curvature-processing network in macaque visual cortex

Abstract: Our visual environment abounds with curved features. Thus, the goal of understanding visual processing should include the processing of curved features. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging in behaving monkeys, we demonstrated a network of cortical areas selective for the processing of curved features. This network includes three distinct hierarchically organized regions within the ventral visual pathway: a posterior curvature-biased patch (PCP) located in the near-foveal representation of dorsal V4, a middle curvature-biased patch (MCP) located on the ventral lip of the posterior superior temporal sulcus (STS) in area TEO, and an anterior curvature-biased patch (ACP) located just below the STS in anterior area TE. Our results further indicate that the processing of curvature becomes increasingly complex from PCP to ACP. The proximity of the curvature-processing network to the well-known face-processing network suggests a possible functional link between them.

Subcortical connections of area V4 in the macaque

Abstract: Area V4 has numerous, topographically organized connections with multiple cortical areas, some of which are important for spatially organized visual processing, and others which seem important for spatial attention Although the topographic organization of V4’s connections with other cortical areas has been established, the detailed topography of its connections with subcortical areas is unclear We therefore injected retrograde and anterograde tracers in different topographical regions of V4 in nine macaques to determine the organization of its subcortical connections The injection sites included representations ranging from the fovea to far peripheral eccentricities in both the upper and lower visual fields The topographically organized connections of V4 included bidirectional connections with four subdivisions of the pulvinar, two subdivisions of the claustrum, and the interlaminar portions of the lateral geniculate nucleus, and efferent projections to the superficial and intermediate layers of the superior colliculus, the thalamic reticular nucleus, and the caudate nucleus All of these structures have a possible role in spatial attention The nontopographic, or converging, connections included bidirectional connections with the lateral nucleus of the amygdala, afferent inputs from the dorsal raphe, median raphe, locus coeruleus, ventral tegmentum and nucleus basalis of Meynert, and efferent projections to the putamen Any role of these structures in attention may be less spatially specific J Comp Neurol 522:1941–1965, 2014

Subcortical connections of area V4 in the macaque

Abstract: Area V4 has numerous, topographically organized connections with multiple cortical areas, some of which are important for spatially organized visual processing, and others which seem important for spatial attention. Although the topographic organization of V4’s connections with other cortical areas has been established, the detailed topography of its connections with subcortical areas is unclear. We therefore injected retrograde and anterograde tracers in different topographical regions of V4 in nine macaques to determine the organization of its subcortical connections. The injection sites included representations ranging from the fovea to far peripheral eccentricities in both the upper and lower visual fields. The topographically organized connections of V4 included bidirectional connections with four subdivisions of the pulvinar, two subdivisions of the claustrum, and the interlaminar portions of the lateral geniculate nucleus, and efferent projections to the superficial and intermediate layers of the superior colliculus, the thalamic reticular nucleus, and the caudate nucleus. All of these structures have a possible role in spatial attention. The nontopographic, or converging, connections included bidirectional connections with the lateral nucleus of the amygdala, afferent inputs from the dorsal raphe, median raphe, locus coeruleus, ventral tegmentum and nucleus basalis of Meynert, and efferent projections to the putamen. Any role of these structures in attention may be less spatially specific. J. Comp. Neurol. 522:1941–1965, 2014. VC 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. INDEXING TERMS: pulvinar; claustrum; caudate; putamen; superior colliculus; amygdala Area V4 plays a central role in the relay of information from lower-order to higher-order visual cortical areas; in particular, V4 is a crucial link in the ventral processing stream for object recognition. In a previous study (Ungerleider et al., 2008), we reported that V4: 1) receives from and projects topographically back to early visual areas V2 and V3; 2) projects forward to superior temporal areas MT (see list for abbreviations) and FST, inferior temporal areas TEO, TEp and TEm, and parietal areas LIPv and LIPd; and 3) has intermediate-type connections with V3A, V4t, TEa, and FEF. In addition to these projections, V4 sites that represent eccentricities beyond 30 project to several additional visual areas in parietal cortex, namely, areas DP, 7a, PO, and VIP. The peripheral field representation of V4 also projects to area TF on the posterior parahippocampal gyrus. Overall, we found that central field representations of V4 have relatively stronger connections with ventral stream areas, whereas peripheral field representations of V4 have relatively stronger connections with dorsal stream areas. Some of these topographic connections likely mediate topographically organized sensory inputs to V4 (e.g., V1, V2), and others may mediate top-down inputs for spatial attention (e.g., FEF, LIP). Although several reports have addressed the connectivity of the foveal and parafoveal representation of V4 with subcortical nuclei (Campos-Ortega and Hayhow, 1972; Benevento and Rezak, 1976; Benevento and Davis, 1977; Norden et al., 1978; Olson and Graybiel, This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Grant sponsor: NIMH Intramural Research Program; Grant sponsor: NEI, NIH; Grant number: RO1EY017292 (to R.D.). *CORRESPONDENCE TO: Leslie G. Ungerleider, Laboratory of Brain & Cognition, NIMH Building 10, Room 4C104, 10 Center Dr., Bethesda, MD 20892. E-mail: ungerlel@mail.nih.gov Received February 13, 2013; Revised November 26, 2013; Accepted November 26, 2013. DOI 10.1002/cne.23513 Published online November 29, 2013 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) VC 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. The Journal of Comparative Neurology | Research in Systems Neuroscience 522:1941–1965 (2014) 1941 RESEARCH ARTICLE

Connectional subdivision of the claustrum: two visuotopic subdivisions in the macaque.

Abstract: The claustrum is a surprisingly large, sheet-like neuronal structure hidden beneath the inner surface of the neocortex. We found that the portions of the claustrum connected with V4 appear to overlap considerably with those portions connected with other cortical visual areas, including V1, V2, MT, MST and FST, TEO and TE. We found extensive reciprocal connections between V4 and the ventral portion of the claustrum (vCl), which extended through at least half of the rostrocaudal extent of the structure. Additionally, in approximately 75% of the cases, we found reciprocal connections between V4 and a more restricted region located farther dorsal, near the middle of the structure (mCl). Both vCl and mCl appear to have at least a crude topographic organization. Based on the projection of these claustrum subdivisions to the amygdala, we propose that vCl and mCl are gateways for the transmission of visual information to the memory system. In addition to these crude visuotopically organized regions, there are other parts of the claustrum that obey the topographical proximity principle, with considerable overlap of their connections. There is only an overall segregation of claustrum regions reciprocally connected to the occipital, parietal, temporal and frontal lobes. The portion of the claustrum connected to the visual cortex is located ventral and posterior; the one connected to the auditory cortex is located dorsal and posterior; the one connected to the somatosensory cortex is located dorsal and medial; the one connected to the frontal premotor and motor cortices is located dorsal and anterior; while the one connected to the temporal cortex is located ventral and anterior. The extensive reciprocal connections of the claustrum with almost the entire neocortex and its projections to the hippocampus, amygdala and basal ganglia prompt us to propose its role as a gateway for perceptual information to the memory system.

Subcortical projections of area v2 in the macaque

Abstract: To investigate the subcortical efferent connections of visual area V2, we injected tritiated amino acids under electrophysiological control into 15 V2 sites in 14 macaques. The injection sites included the fovea representation as well as representations ranging from central to far peripheral eccentricities in both the upper and lower visual fields. The results indicated that V2 projects topographically to different portions of the inferior and lateral pulvinar and to the superficial and intermediate layers of the superior colliculus. Within the pulvinar, the V2 projections terminated in fields P1, P2, and P4, with the strongest projection being in P2. Central visual field injections in V2 labeled projection zones in P1 and P2, whereas peripheral field injections labeled P1, P2, and P4. No projections were found in P3. Both central and peripheral field injections in V2 projected topographically to the superficial and intermediate layers of the superior colliculus. Projections from V2 to the pulvinar and the superior colliculus constituted cortical-subcortical loops through which circuits serving spatial attention are activated.

Lesions of prefrontal cortex reduce attentional modulation of neuronal responses and synchrony in V4

Abstract: It is widely held that the frontal eye field (FEF) in prefrontal cortex (PFC) modulates processing in visual cortex with attention, although the evidence for a necessary role is equivocal. To help identify critical sources of attentional feedback to area V4, we surgically removed the entire lateral PFC, including the FEF, in one hemisphere and transected the corpus callosum and anterior commisure in two macaques. This deprived V4 of PFC input in one hemisphere while keeping the other hemisphere intact. In the absence of PFC, attentional effects on neuronal responses and synchrony in V4 were significantly reduced and the remaining effects of attention were delayed in time indicating a critical role of PFC. Conversely, distracters captured attention and influenced V4 responses. However, because the effects of attention in V4 were not eliminated by PFC lesions, other sources of top-down attentional control signals to visual cortex must exist outside of PFC. The prefrontal cortex (PFC) has been implicated in the control of numerous cognitive functions including visual attention. Evidence from lesion and inactivation studies in both monkeys and humans has suggested that executive function and attention is impaired when

Intersubject variability in fearful face processing: the link between behavior and neural activation

Abstract: Stimuli that signal threat show considerable variability in the extents to which they enhance behavior, even among healthy individuals. However, the neural underpinning of this behavioral variability is not well understood. By manipulating expectation of threat in an fMRI study of fearful versus neutral face categorization, we uncovered a network of areas underlying variability in threat processing in healthy adults. We explicitly altered expectations by presenting face images at three different expectation levels: 80 %, 50 %, and 20 %. Subjects were instructed to report as quickly and accurately as possible whether the face was fearful (signaled threat) or not. An uninformative cue preceded each face by 4 s. By taking the difference between reaction times (RTs) to fearful and neutral faces, we quantified an overall fear RT bias (i.e., faster to fearful than to neutral faces) for each subject. This bias correlated positively with late-trial fMRI activation (8 s after the face) during unexpected-fearful-face trials in bilateral ventromedial prefrontal cortex, the left subgenual cingulate cortex, and the right caudate nucleus, and correlated negatively with early-trial fMRI activation (4 s after the cue) during expected-neutral-face trials in bilateral dorsal striatum and the right ventral striatum. These results demonstrate that the variability in threat processing among healthy adults is reflected not only in behavior, but also in the magnitude of activation in medial prefrontal and striatal regions that appear to encode affective value.

Connectional subdivision of the claustrum: two visuotopic subdivisions in the macaque

Abstract: The claustrum is a surprisingly large, sheet-like neuronal structure hidden beneath the inner surface of the neocortex. We found that the portions of the claustrum connected with V4 appear to overlap considerably with those portions connected with other cortical visual areas, including V1, V2, MT, MST and FST, TEO and TE. We found extensive reciprocal connections between V4 and the ventral portion of the claustrum (vCl), which extended through at least half of the rostrocaudal extent of the structure. Additionally, in approximately 75% of the cases, we found reciprocal connections between V4 and a more restricted region located farther dorsal, near the middle of the structure (mCl). Both vCl and mCl appear to have at least a crude topographic organization. Based on the projection of these claustrum subdivisions to the amygdala, we propose that vCl and mCl are gateways for the transmission of visual information to the memory system. In addition to these crude visuotopically organized regions, there are other parts of the claustrum that obey the topographical proximity principle, with considerable overlap of their connections. There is only an overall segregation of claustrum regions reciprocally connected to the occipital, parietal, temporal and frontal lobes. The portion of the claustrum connected to the visual cortex is located ventral and posterior; the one connected to the auditory cortex is located dorsal and posterior; the one connected to the somatosensory cortex is located dorsal and medial; the one connected to the frontal premotor and motor cortices is located dorsal and anterior; while the one connected to the temporal cortex is located ventral and anterior. The extensive reciprocal connections of the claustrum with almost the entire neocortex and its projections to the hippocampus, amygdala and basal ganglia prompt us to propose its role as a gateway for perceptual information to the memory system.